NEWS ROUNDUP

KLAMATH: Town Hall Meeting Planned On February 24, 2004, the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals effectively invalidated the listing of the Oregon Coast coho salmon as a "threatened species" under the Endangered Species Act (ESA). In September 2001, in Alsea Valley Alliance v. Evans, Judge Hogan ruled that the National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS) acted illegally in protecting fish spawning in the wild, but not hatchery fish, which are genetically identical. The NMFS' counting of only naturally spawned salmon while totally disregarding hatchery spawned salmon kept the fish count artificially low, justifying otherwise needless ESA protections and locking up land use. The Court's order invalidating and setting aside the coho listing had been postponed during the appeal and finally reinstated on February 24, 2004. Consequently, the Oregon North Coast coho listing no longer exists and may not be enforced. This decision stands to have huge implications for land stewards and natural resource providers such as farmers, ranchers, and timber harvesters as well as local governments and citizens struggling with infrastructure development of schools, hospitals, and highways....
Editorial: Time to fund, tune Endangered Species Act The Endangered Species Act is the source of a major Western irony: The forces most critical of delays in getting animals such as wolves and grizzly bears removed from endangered species lists also work to constrain funding for the biological research that might expedite the animals' removal. The result is that, in some cases anyway, species that probably are ready to be delisted stay in place, along with the protections that go with their endangered or threatened status. It's a kind of Catch-22: The studies and remediation it would take to get species off the lists under the law cost more money than the government has been willing to spend, with the result that the animals stay on the lists and the restrictions that gall so many farmers and ranchers stay in place....
North Port men fined $100,000 for disturbing eagle's nest Two men were ordered to pay a combined $100,000 in fines last week for cutting down a tree housing an eagle's nest, so they could sell the lot. Mylon Stockton, 36, of Noblesville, Ind., was ordered to pay a total of $90,000 for violating the Bald and Golden Eagle Protection Act, according to the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Services. Co-defendant, Mark A. Borinsky, 39, of North Port, was fined $10,000 after pleading guilty to a similar offense. Both were placed on probation for one year after being sentenced by U.S. District Judge James D. Whittemore in Tampa. "The existence of an endangered species on property can preclude an owner from taking any action that will disturb the nest," said Mike Elkins, USFWS special agent for the Southeast Region....
FWS reinstates 'no surprises' assurances A memo sent last month by the director of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to FWS regional directors is being hailed as good news by landowners such as timber operators who complete habitat conservation plans as part of their long-term operations. In his memo to the regional directors, FWS Director Steve Williams indicated that FWS has satisfied an order to complete the rulemaking process regarding incidental take permits or related documents containing "no surprises" assurances. The "no surprises" rule describes circumstances in which FWS may revoke incidental take permits issued under the Endangered Species Act. According to Williams' directive, the service can now provide assurances to landowners with HCPs that they won't lose their incidental take permits under certain circumstances. "No surprises" assurances are provided by the government to landowners who are assured that if unforeseen circumstances arise, the FWS will not require the commitment of additional land, water or financial compensation or additional restrictions on the use of land, water or other natural resources beyond the level otherwise agreed to in the habitat conservation plan without the landowner's consent....
Metropolitan Becomes First to Sign Onto 50-Year Habitat Conservation Program for Lower Colorado River After more than eight years of study and negotiation, the Metropolitan Water District of Southern California today became the first entity to authorize one of the nation's largest habitat conservation programs, covering 27 species along more than 450 miles of the lower Colorado River. Metropolitan's Board of Directors committed $88.5 million over the life of a 50-year program that protects the storage, release and diversion of Colorado River water from Lake Mead to the Mexico border from interruptions because of endangered species issues. The program also addresses potential impacts of projects, programs and water transfers to be realized under California's plan to reduce the state's use of Colorado River water. "Instead of a piecemeal, species-by-species approach, this multispecies program proactively addresses endangered species issues that threaten water supplies throughout the West," said Metropolitan board Chairman Wes Bannister....
Bugs lead to fires in 'overmature' forests All across the Rockies, which stretch from Canada to Mexico, there is an unprecedented amount of beetles munching through all kinds of coniferous trees. It’s not just mountain pine beetles, said Roy Mask, a U.S. Forest Service entomologist based in Gunnison. “All of the Rocky Mountains are incurring an unprecedented epidemic of pine bark beetles of all kinds,” he said. In Colorado alone there are hundreds of thousands of acres of dead trees. “The outbreak is going on a very large scale,” Mask said. At lower elevations beetles are attacking piñons, and at higher elevations there is an epidemic of beetles munching on ponderosa, lodgepole, spruce and fir. The Forest Service tallies the number of trees killed by beetles by aerial survey, and the latest results are still being tallied, Mask said....
Court ships wilds suit back to Utah The "no more wilderness settlement" is headed back to U.S. District Court in Utah. The 10th Circuit Court of Appeals on Tuesday dismissed a bid by a coalition of environmental groups to kill the 2003 deal signed by then-Utah Gov. Mike Leavitt and Interior Secretary Gale Norton to end a Utah lawsuit. The settlement froze the state's wilderness study areas at 3.2 million acres and eliminated from consideration nearly 6 million acres of potential wilderness that was inventoried during the Clinton administration. But the appeals court did not uphold the settlement either. Instead, the panel shipped the case back to U.S. District Judge Dee Benson for further review....
No Man's Land A 60-year-old paperwork snafu could mean that a Native American family will soon be homeless. The Sharpe family has lived on 160 acres of homesteaded land in the Pahrump valley since the 1940s. But the BLM recently informed the family that the land doesn't belong to them, even though they've been paying taxes on it all these years. The property could end up in the hands of developers instead. Nye County has listed the Sharpe's as the owners for decades. But the Bureau of Land Management has decided the land does not belong to the Sharpe's because of a paperwork oversight....
BLM land sale, development boom could reshape rural Nevada county The sale of 20 square miles of federal land in Lincoln County could fuel a development boom and a 15-fold population increase in a rural county now home to fewer than 4,000 residents, officials said. The federal Bureau of Land Management has estimated that 60,000 people could live in developments in the patchwork of parcels making up 13,330 undeveloped acres offered for sale Wednesday at auction in Mesquite. Combined, the area is almost as large as New York's Manhattan island. Kevin Finn, a BLM realty specialist, called the auction historic in scale....
Nev. Officials Probe Huge Rock Slide Denver-based Newmont Mining Corp. and government regulators worked Tuesday to determine the cause and potential environmental effects of a 10 million-ton rock slide at a gold mine that buried a Nevada highway. The weekend collapse of the waste rock pile at the Gold Quarry mine north of Carlin covered Nevada Route 766 for about 1,300 feet -- the length of more than four football fields, Newmont officials said. No one was injured in Saturday night's slide, which also took out power lines. Nearly 1 million tons of rock and dirt was piled up to 50 feet high on the two-lane highway that is largely used to service the mine. The road about 275 miles east of Reno near Elko is likely to be closed for days....
Conservation Group Opposes Sensenbrenner “Real ID Act” Defenders of Wildlife today announced its strong opposition to provisions of H.R. 418, the “Real ID Act,” introduced by House Judiciary Chairman James Sensenbrenner (R-WI) on January 26 and scheduled to be heard on the House floor tomorrow. Although the legislation primarily addresses national security and immigration issues, Section 102(c) of H.R. 418 also includes sweeping language allowing the Secretary of the Department of Homeland Security to exempt the agency from all federal, state and local environmental laws when constructing walls, fences, roads and other barriers along U.S. borders. Although Representative Sensenbrenner has repeatedly described H.R. 418 as applying only to a border fencing project in San Diego, section 102(c)(1) would in reality likely waive laws in all areas not only along, but “in the vicinity of”, U.S. international borders with both Mexico and Canada—nearly 7,500 miles in total....
Column: Giving Power to the People The World Economic Forum handed researchers a list of countries ranked by pollution levels and asked them to identify explanatory factors. The findings were a surprise. Think of the usual suspects you might expect to promote pollution. Urbanization? Car ownership? Big Oil? Wrong, wrong, and wrong again. None of these factors has predictive power. In fact, countries that score highest when it comes to clean environments also score high in terms of per capita income. On the other hand countries with poor records of environmental protection tend to have poor showings in the league tables compiled by worldwide corruption watchdog Transparency International. Nature thrives in a habitat of efficient economies and an arms length relationship between business and government. These findings offer important conclusions for environmentalists, economists and energy regulators. Vijay Vaitheeswaran spells out the implications in his book Power to the People....
After Delays, Kyoto Global Warming Pact to Start A landmark U.N. plan to curb global warming comes into force next week despite a U.S. pullout and with many countries way off course to meet promised cuts in emissions of heat-trapping gases by 2012. The Kyoto pact is meant to rein in rising temperatures that many scientists say will cause more storms, droughts and floods and raise world sea levels. Climate shifts could disrupt farming and wipe out thousands of species of animals and plants. The 141-nation protocol, which will force countries to cap emissions of gases, enters into force on Feb. 16 after years of controversy since it was agreed in 1997. Even so, many countries bound by Kyoto are running far above its overall goal of curbing rich nations' emissions of heat-trapping gases like carbon dioxide from cars, factories and power plants by 5.2 percent below 1990 levels by 2008-12. Among Kyoto states, Spain and Portugal were 40.5 percent above 1990 levels in 2002, according to U.N. data. Monaco, Ireland, Greece, New Zealand and Canada are all further over 1990 levels than the United States, whose emissions are 13.1 percent over the Kyoto benchmark year....
Plan to clone giant sheep raises questions Environmental watchdogs are expected to question the potential risks of cloning the world's biggest wild sheep species to crossbreed with farmed animals in New Zealand. Forest and Bird and the Department of Conservation (DOC) are known to have concerns about the risk of feral argali eventually establishing a pest population in the wild. Forest and Bird officials fear that because argali are an endangered species in their native Asian habitat, but highly valued by affluent hunters as a trophy species, they may be deliberately released and spread in the wild....
Belt buckles are trophies fit for wranglers Richard Rattenburg, the curator of history at the National Cowboy & Western Heritage Museum in Oklahoma City, said that buckles began being awarded in rodeos during the early part of the 20th century. Credit the introduction of the belt loop on pants around 1910-1912 for the trend, Rattenburg said. "Cowboys didn't wear buckles, because they didn't wear belts, they wore suspenders," Rattenburg said. "When the buckles started being awarded, they weren't engraved and were made of relatively thin silver plate." The nine buckles awarded at the San Antonio Stock Show & Rodeo (one for each of six events, two for team roping and one for all-around) were designed by Joanne Symons, who owns Hy O Silver in Bandera. It takes about 10 hours to fashion each sterling silver oval with its 10- and 14-carat overlays. Each buckle is worth about $1,200....